


Anything I Ever Did (Or, Black Star needs to be less subtle)

by happyisahabit



Series: Starlight Collection [29]
Category: Soul Eater
Genre: F/M, Getting Together, Mentions of Paralysis, Miscommunication, Tumblr Prompt, mentions of violence and recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:34:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25078444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happyisahabit/pseuds/happyisahabit
Summary: Tumblr prompt from soundofez: Anything I ever did was just another way to scream your name.Black Star thinks he could not have been more obvious if there was a neon sign hanging around his neck. Turns out, he's wrong.
Relationships: Maka Albarn/Black Star
Series: Starlight Collection [29]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/674591
Comments: 5
Kudos: 22





	Anything I Ever Did (Or, Black Star needs to be less subtle)

**Author's Note:**

> Fun prompt idea from fez! I almost set this in my TtLL AU, but decided to make it neutral. Injuries after the Battle On The Moon as described in TtLL apply, but they should be obvious enough in this fic that you don't need to read it.

Anything I ever did was just another way to scream your name.

Black Star doesn’t do subtlety. 

He just doesn’t. Everything about him is loud, neon-colored and in your face. His hair is bright blue for all the black he wears. His voice booms and echoes off the walls. His soul is expansive and easy to push out of his body, easy to make tangible. His personality has been described as ‘obnoxious,’ ‘grating,’ and ‘bold’. He has never thought anything about him was a secret or that his intentions were muddled and hidden.

So it is with some degree of surprise that Black Star has to admit he may need to be more direct about this. He may need to tell Maka point-blank that he loves her.

Though blessed with a loose tongue and high volume, actions have always spoken even louder for Black Star. Since meeting her, Maka’s determined gaze and tiny fists were either in his face or in his dreams. He distracted her when her parents fought. He beat up her bullies when they tried to follow her home from school. He took her rage when she found out he hadn’t let her deal with them herself.

He did try to hide it for a while, when they got their weapons, he supposes. Black Star wasn’t always there, but he did his best. He fought with her under the school on Christmas Eve. He went after her assailants when she got paralyzed. He almost said it outloud then, in the hospital room. Leaving with a sour taste in his mouth of both defeat and forced humility, he gave her a piece of candy and half-cocked excuses and non-answers. The hole in the wall from his fist was still outside her ward. 

His feelings are easier to express aloud when he doesn’t have burning green eyes staring at him. He screams at Crona, about loyalty and betrayal;  _ he  _ would never betray her- not for money, for fame, for  _ power _ even. And he gets power, lots of it, and uses it for his friends’ benefit, and for hers. Standing in front of her, saving her, taking the hit and using his soul where she could not, he bleeds his love for her in the most obvious way he can imagine.

Yet, when she teases him, asking if he likes her, all Black Star can do is deny it even if the truth is stained rosy red all over his face.

Black Star breaks himself, surpasses all logical limits of the human body, and then tells her to look away from him, not to worry. She needs to focus and she needs to stay alive, she is more important. He hears white noise and feels the weight of opportunities, of time lost when she is speared through the torso. His soul vibrates with a curious mix of horror and elation when she emerges mad but breathing. His broken body pushes itself even further.

Then, Maka disappears. With an elegant flick of the tail of a black ruffled dress, she is gone from his sight for six minutes, forty-two seconds. The world is engulfed after that and Black Star can only hold her sobbing form with his broken arm and keep them upright with his fractured spine for long enough. He endures.

The scars of his devotion to her are erratic raised lines mirrored on his chest and back, the change in tone of his voice from ripped vocal chords, a numbness in his fingers, and the new normal of soul-powered leg braces. Maka stays by his side as he recovers, with her injuries needing the time as well. He thinks she understands then just what he feels, what he would do for her.

Well, he  _ thought _ .

Maka sits behind him, her back to the arm of the sofa and his legs stretched out over the other cushions. There’s a pillow between them so his head is tilted back into her hands. Random stand-up comedians continue playing on the television, but Black Star hasn’t been paying attention for a while. Maka’s fingers twist his hair this way and that, no doubt making it stand up even more. It’s soothing and he is on the cusp of sleep.

She hums and shifts a little, so her legs stretch out along his sides and the pillow drapes on her stomach. Black Star moves with her, nestling himself into the couch and tucking an arm around one of Maka’s legs. His thumb brushes lightly over the skin above her ankle and her fingers retract from his hair at once.

“Star?”

He hums sleepily at her, tracing his fingers over her leg again and reveling how this hand retained full ability to feel.

“What are you doing?”

Tilting his head up grants him a view of her face. It is tentative and a little surprised. He doesn’t understand why. Her hands hover near her head uncertainly. Black Star’s hand squeezes as he readjusts to avoid straining his neck and she flinches.

“Did that hurt you?” he asks immediately.

“No!” she says, just as quick. Color is flooding her cheeks and her hands curl into fists. “I just…”

Black Star doesn’t get it; they must have lounged around watching bad TV a hundred times by now. What is different? Is it just his touch? Experimentally, he pushes himself up and twists around, feeling the twitch in her legs just as easily as he pushes his soul out like lightning to fire the nerves in his muscles. “Just what?”

Looking at her now, Maka seems off-balance. Her fists still hover awkwardly by her red face and her eyes won’t look at him. The pillow is skewed on her stomach and her knees are twitchy under his hands. 

“I don’t understand,” she mumbles after he waits. “Why would you… touch me like that?”

“Same reason you play with my hair, I think,” he says. Something creeps through the corners of his mind, taunting him, whispering that maybe what he thought was Maka’s understanding of his feelings, thought was  _ reciprocation _ , was false.

“Because… it’s soft?” Maka tries, voice meek. Black Star tightens his grip on her legs a little. He stings at the gentle deflection.

“No,” he says, voice a bit louder. “Because-” he cuts himself off. Has he not been obvious about his affections? Had he read her actions wrong this whole time? He thought she knew, but her posture here clearly shows otherwise.

“Star-”

“Because I want to.” He catches her eyes and stares into endless green with all his courage. “And because I thought you did, too.”

“This is sudden,” she says, hands loosening from her fists. 

“It’s not,” he counters. Unable to help it, his eyes flick down to where the edge of the scar from Varja is visible from the neck of her shirt. Thin fingers brush lightly below his collarbone, the edges of the black fire scarring raised there. 

“I suppose it isn’t,” Maka mumbles.

“Mak,” he says, pushing the pillow to the floor. Maka continues tracing the lines of his scars and it raises gooseflesh. “Do you need me to say it?”

“Say what?”

He doesn’t know if she’s trying to deflect, trying to avoid the conversation, give him an out, or if she’s really oblivious. One tug pulls Maka down onto the cushions. He doesn’t hover over her, still leaning back as far as his hands gripping her legs let him.

“I love you. Always have, always will.” Black Star’s voice is steady and not at all quiet. It’s the last screaming neon sign he hopes he has to give her. Green eyes wide, she looks up at him as though seeing him fully for the first time. Her hands reach up again, touching the etched lines on his face, threading softly into his hair. He keeps steady, but lets his thumbs rub lightly on the inside of her knees.

This time, she does not flinch. His hair is tightly grasped and his balance is thrown off. He has to quickly brace an elbow on the cushion above her head to avoid headbutting her, but even then, it doesn’t stop contact. Maka’s mouth is demanding and not at all subtle. Black Star lets himself fall into her and she catches him with grabby hands, bracketing legs, and open lips.

His heart thuds like a stampede in his chest, because  _ finally. _ She hears him, calling for her as he always has.

She mumbles his name and ‘thank  _ god _ ’ and ‘should’ve known’ into his mouth but he swallows her words and determines to tell her all the ways he’s ever screamed her name and show her all the ways he still wants to.

**Author's Note:**

> If you have Soul Eater rarepair prompts, feel free to send em on tumblr (same username, happyisahabit)! I'd love to add more rarely seen matchups to AO3 to go along with my OTP. :)


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